How to fight those foxy forces of evil effectively

Keith Stuart regretted it as soon as he posted. Last week a Fox News report on the Xbox 360 game Mass Effect characterised the critically acclaimed sci-fi epic as a sexually explicit adventure filled with nudity. In a ludicrously partisan and ill-informed onslaught, a mature-rated title that involves a few seconds of bare flesh found itself referred to as "Luke Skywalker meets Debbie Does Dallas".

A few days later Keith Stuart blogged about how gamers were taking out their frustration with Fox News by hitting the Amazon page of TV presenter Cooper Lawrence, who took part in the televised debate, and flooding the reviews section of her latest book with increasingly personal insults. Keith later deleted his story - there didn't seem to be any point in contributing to the mass of sneering blogs and forum posts, edging toward darker threats. The fact that Lawrence has now told the New York Times that she regretted her remarks should not - but probably will - add validity to the onslaught. Is the future of direct action by gamers set to be dictated by this revenge sortie? Surely there's another way. Fox News, after all, is the ringleader in this little circus, not Lawrence.

Nice Article, Very well written. And points out that Gamers need to be more constructive and not childish. But is truthful enough to mentions his response. and further deletion of it and the reason why.

His last paragraph is what really gets me. He should go look up all those articles about the Child-man / Man-child that all 18-24 year olds are being labeled.

The democracy of the internet has given anyone and almost everyone a voice no matter how uninformed or childish it is. Typically well reasoned people stay clear of getting into such petty things, ergo why the rude behavior shines through.

He alludes to an organized body to fight against the agencies seeking to harm the gaming business. But I would say that we have done a good job of handling business ourselves in this most recent incident.

She harmed the game (Mass Effect) and perpetuated the hatred that uninformed people have on gaming itself. She was set upon by the gaming community, that brought itself together not under a unified consortium, but individually... yet in mass. We the gamers recognized the harm that she created and stirred up and acted out, our united rebuttal was the effect.

I say that the best way to curb any further such false representation of gaming as a plague upon civilization is to make the media know that we can unite. A mass of gamers protecting their self interest without a single unified body for the media to battle with. If someone has a representative to battle against then they feel that they have an edge of the legal system and arbitration behind them. But with our non-organized, non-lead force... we have a much greater effect on the outcome of our actions. We can fight without the option of retaliation upon us individually. How can the forces fight against that which is structurless? That is the secret that will make our Mass Effect even more powerful.

And to give a little shout out... why have we not yet focused on Fox as a major contribution in this turmoil? They still have not posted a retraction or apology for their part in this deal. They still are seeking media attention from an event that they helped to create. They are equally as subject to our disdain as she was. Why then have we not forced their hand to step up and take accountability for their part? Why do they get the free ride? Any suggestions as to how we can effect them enough to get their attention too?